Bad Cop/Bad Cop came together after playing in other Bay Area bands. Credit: Coutesy Photo / Bad Cop/Bad Cop

Sometimes you just gotta let it all out. And if you’re San Francisco punk band Bad Cop/Bad Cop, you gotta let it out while making it catchy as hell.

The all-female quartet, which will hit the Paper Tiger Tuesday, April 25, has done plenty of time in the trenches. Formed in 2011, the group came together after playing in other Bay Area bands. The outfit’s catchy-but-abrasive sound led it to Fat Wreck Chords, the label co-founded by Erin Burkett and Fat Mike of NOFX, a veteran act mining similar sonic territory.

The Current talked to guitarist-vocalist Stacey Dee via Zoom from her current home in Long Beach, California. “Home of Snoop Dogg and Sublime,” she noted.

The conversation included talk about everything from the value of community to Dee’s status as a cancer survivor to how drugs almost wrecked Bad Cop/Bad Cop. Her new, more positive outlook is reflected in the band’s most recent LP, 2020’s The Ride. She’s also one of the founders of the Sidewalk Project, a Los Angeles nonprofit that assists the unhoused.

The interview is edited for length and clarity.

Your lyrics are direct. Take a song like “Breastless” from The Ride. You’re a cancer survivor. Is it hard to be onstage singing a song that’s so raw but also infectious?

No. In fact, it is healing for me to talk about it and to help other people that might be going through it. On [May 9], it will be four years that I’m cancer-free. After the show, there’s always two or three women that come up and say, “I’m going through this and I’m fucking really scared, and Oh, my God and …” I’m always really open to speaking with anybody who’s going through it.

Would you say that getting sober energized that part of your life?

It’s always been a part of my life. When I was a kid, I grew up in a trailer park. A pretty poor family in an affluent area. I grew up with brown people, not other rich white people in town. (Laughs.) There was a kid in my neighborhood named Apple. At 14 or 15, he was expelled from school. I knew that white privilege in that town was super real. I made a big stink about it. I said, “How could you kick a child out of school? Why wouldn’t you do anything to work with him? It’s because he wasn’t important to you.” He was a Filipino kid. He was so poor. His parents couldn’t speak English. “And you guys didn’t give a fuck.” I was standing up for my friend! After that, I had a lot of my parents’ friends thank me. It’s always been in me. … OK, so I’m not sober. I drink wine. And I smoke weed. But I don’t do blow and pills anymore, so that’s good. (Laughs.)

Sounds like one of your lyrics.

Right? I went through the gnarliest shit getting off. I’ve gone through a couple of runs with drugs. From 20 to 30, I had my guitar in my hands, and I was very focused on music, so I only smoked weed. Pretty much. But I was pretty negative my whole life up until I went through this massive awakening. I had an addiction to Xanax. I was taking like two to three bars of that shit a day. Maybe eight years I did that? When I got off of it, I went to detox. Coming off of that stuff was the hardest thing I’ve ever done. I was seeing things that weren’t there. Hearing things that weren’t there. It took me a year of this life change I went through. I would see things out of the corner of my eye. I was like, “Oh my god, is that a pile of dead kittens?” I needed to pick something else, and I felt like I was being shocked with all of this information on how to have a good life on this planet, right?

I’m guessing it was difficult for the other band members when you were using. Now you’re “California sober.” Isn’t that what the kids say?

That’s what it’s called! But here’s the other thing: I’m responsible. I’m not trying to use to hurt myself. It’s a whole different thing. I’m enjoying life. I love trying new wines. I love trying new weed. I love great meals. It’s a different place.

How has being “California sober” impacted the working relationships within the band? I’m guessing they’ve improved.

My band is [made up of] such wonderful human beings. First off, they were so mad at me. We were on a tour, and I had a bottoming out. Fought everybody. I ended up on my back in a puddle with a torn ACL, in the rain, and my band not wanting to talk to me anymore. I had gone to the hotel room and ended up in the emergency room. I didn’t even go back to see my band. I got flown out of there and left them without any shows to play, any money to make, any of that shit. I stranded them and I really fucked up. Then when I got home, I was like (yells): “You guys did this to me! You did this!” (Laughs.)

I’m sure they loved that.

Then they had an intervention with me and said that this band will be over, or you will not be in it anymore if you do not get well. And I said, “I don’t need to go to rehab. What I need to do is get off this shit safely.” Little did I know that coming home after detox was when the shit would hit the fan. Rehab would have been a good idea. Instead, I went through my own shit with it. [Drummer] Myra [Gallarza] kept saying, “You can’t give up, you have to keep going.” As much as [guitarist] Jennie [Cotterill] and [bassist] Linh [Le] didn’t want to talk to me at that time, Myra pushed for it, and I got into a room with them. I said, “I know I did this.”

You’re playing in San Antonio with Fea, and I know you’re a fan. What makes them so great?

One, that they’re all women. Two, they’re mostly Latina. I’m almost four years in to learning Spanish, and I love the culture. I grew up with a lot of Mexican folks. And listening to [Fea’s] music, they’re got such a cool sound. It’s super punk! And now that they’ve got Adrian [Conner]. She plays Angus in an AC/DC cover band, Hell’s Belles. I’ve known her for 20 years. My first band used to play with her in San Francisco. When I saw Adrian, I was like, “No shit, dude! Remember my band the Angry Amputees?” And she was like, “I love the Angry Amputees!”

Got any good stories about Fat Mike?

I have a lot of stories about Mike. I was in a lot of bands from San Francisco, and Fat Wreck is from San Francisco. One time my old band Compton SF was opening for the Loved Ones, a Fat Wreck Chords band, in the city. Afterwards, we all went to the Eagle, this really great gay bar in the city. We were just all hangin’ out afterwards. Mike was playing pool, and I was like, “Alright, Mike.” This was before Bad Cop was signed. Before I ever did anything with them. Mike had always liked me and my bands but never gave us an offer or a deal or anything. He was always like, “You gotta have more than one good song.” So, that night I said, “OK, we’re gonna play pool, and I’m gonna bet you.” At the time, my ex-husband was a radio DJ for the BBC in London. And I said, “If you win, my partner will play your least-selling band on his show for a month. And if I win, you have to write a song I get to sing on.” He was kicking my ass. At the very end he was about to do the kill shot and shoot in the eight-ball. And he scratched and I won. (Laughs.) He never welches on a bet. We were gonna be playing in the city maybe three or four months later, and we gave him the date. When we got offstage, he said, “I’m putting out an EP with you guys.” Couple days later I got a call from him saying, “I’m signing Bad Cop.” Mike is like my older brother. He wants my lyrics to be precise. If I come to him with something, he’ll be like, “Stacey, how old are you? Why would you say you’re a kid here? You’re like 45!” (Laughs.)

How did NOFX — and Fat Mike — influence the band and you as a songwriter?

I started listening to NOFX when I was in my late teens. More so in my early 20s. I was living down in Santa Barbara. I had a pretty gnarly drug thing happening. I went from everything from ecstasy to meth to crack. But I never shot heroin. Luckily. When I finally decided to pick up my guitar, I knew I wanted to be in a punk rock band, and NOFX was one of those bands I listened to. I was like, “These lyrics are great, the way it makes me feel is great. They’re funny but smart.” The truth is I’m never gonna be someone that’s like, “And now I do country! Now I’m writing a pop record!”

So, you finished high school in the early 90s?

In ’93. If you remember ’87, ’88, ’89, hip-hop came in. And it came in in a way that was closely ingrained with punk rock. It had the same kind of culture and ethics and coolness and newness — all this kinda stuff. The Beastie Boys, Run-D.M.C. Even before that with (sings): “Double dutch bus coming down the street.”

Let’s talk about your song “My Life” from 2014’s Boss Lady. My immediate thought was that it’s only a couple letters from the Beatles classic “In My Life.” But clearly these ladies aren’t like the Beatles. Then I heard the song, and the harmonies, the catchy chorus and I thought maybe they are like the Beatles.

Everyone in the band loves to sing and loves to jump into it. I think we have so much fun and it’s so infectious that there is a lot of Beatles stuff. If only we could play those chords. The Beatles chords were just … (Pauses.) People think the Beatles is easy music, but that is some of the most sophisticated writing. People go, “Oh my god, you guys are like the punk rock Beatles.” We do kinda have that thing going on. That’s for sure.

You’ve played here before. Any San Antonio memories you’d like to share?

Yes! I have family that comes from Wimberley. So, travelling between San Antonio and Austin, that’s my family’s land. Not like we own anything. (Laughs.) But I have so much family on my dad’s side that it’s pretty interesting. My dad’s dad disappeared when he was quite young. We have since tracked down that side of the family, so we have really strong family in San Antonio, Wimberley and Austin. There’s a grave site in Wimberley that’s the Dee cemetery that was dedicated to my great-grandmother and great-grandfather.

$17-$20, 8:30 p.m. Tuesday, April 25, Paper Tiger, 2410 N. St. Mary’s St., papertigersatx.com.

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This article appears in Apr 5-18, 2023.